Warsaw NATO Summit didn’t Refer to the South Caucasus: Lukyanov

“NATO-Russia confrontation bears artificial character,” Fyodor Lukyanov, Editor-in-Chief of Russia in Global Affairs, Chairman of the Presidium of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, and Research Director of the Valdai International Discussion Club, told “168 Hours” reflecting to the results of NATO Summit held in Warsaw.

In his words main decision was deploying multi-nation battalions in Baltic countries and Poland. According to him it has serious political importance, and not military one, as they’re not going to be large in number, thus, obtaining symbolic importance. According to Fyodor Lukyanov, it’s interesting enough that this was not a message to Russia, but to the countries, which were complaining of passive policy pursued by NATO.

According to the assessments of the Russian analyst, it was a message that NATO, will protect its all member countries, as well as the new ones. On the other hand, in his words, this provides Russian policy the opportunity to claim, that NATO approaches to Russia, as Russia’s officials state throughout recent years. In his conviction, in fact, this confrontation even bears artificial character, as what refers Russia, there is no such external threat, as it’s beneficial to have external threat for internal consumption. The same, according to Lukyanov, occurs in Western communities as well, as issues have emerged in those organizations.

“Basically, serious changes won’t be recorded after Warsaw, new security environment isn’t being established, however, contrasts aren’t being eliminated as well, like Jens Stoltenberg, NATO Secretary General, stated yesterday after Russia-NATO Council session. Discordances between NATO and Russia continue, and as I have already mentioned, their grounds are not so clear to me,” Lukyanov said.

To the question what has changed for the South Caucasus after this Summit, Lukyanov replied—almost nothing. According to him, the change is the new depth recorded in Georgia-NATO relations and big assistance to be provided to Georgia by NATO. “I consider, the Summit on the whole couldn’t refer to the South Caucasus, as only Georgia strives to engage with NATO, and other two states have already chosen their direction,” he said.

By Araks Martirosyan